


Recollection

by fecklessphilanderer



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Crying, Dreams, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Marriage, Memory Loss, Mentions of Blood, Minor Injuries, remembering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-10
Updated: 2019-12-09
Packaged: 2021-02-24 15:47:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21740425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fecklessphilanderer/pseuds/fecklessphilanderer
Summary: "The first memory comes back when you and Asra are working in the shop. Your hands hover over a pot on the fire, carefully pouring a glass vial of river water into a new potion you’re experimenting on.You shatter the vial in your hand.How could you have forgotten?"mc starts to remember their life before the plague and before losing their memories. Asra is happy, then worried that they might remember something that could hurt.
Relationships: Asra (The Arcana)/Reader
Comments: 15
Kudos: 195





	1. Scattered

“But when from a long-distant past nothing subsists, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered, still, alone, more fragile, but with more vitality, more unsubstantial, more persistent, more faithful, the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls, ready to remind us, waiting and hoping for their moment, amid the ruins of all the rest; and bear unfaltering, in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence, the vast structure of recollection.” (Marcel Proust. _Overture_ )

The first memory comes back when you and Asra are working in the shop. Your hands hover over a pot on the fire, carefully pouring a glass vial of river water into a new potion you’re experimenting on. 

_You see hands placing a bowl in front of you. From your position at the massive table the hands seem huge. A caregiver. Your favorite stew._

You shatter the vial in your hand.

How could you have forgotten?

Asra rushes to tend your wound but all you can do is stare at your palm. Red blood wells up but you can’t feel it. You barely notice when Asra guides you to sit. In his hands you move easily. Just as you had when you first awoke after you died.

He picks the shards out with a pair of tweezers, mentioning something about getting Ilya to take a look.

The tweezers bring you back to your body with a pained hiss. Asra smiles a little. The pinch in his brows loosens. Was this what you were like when he tried to make you remember before? Numb?

But this time feels different. This time you are sitting on the workbench in the shop, you can smell sage and feel Asra’s warm hands on yours. He digs out the largest piece of glass and when you grunt, he makes a sympathetic sound.

You recite the recipe for your favorite stew aloud. You cannot remember Asra ever making it since you first awoke in this new body. One of the ingredients is exceedingly rare in Vesuvia. You can tell Asra knows it by the way he stiffens and drops the bloody tweezers.

“y/n?”

“I thought you said I would never regain the memories?”

**…**

Life goes on for the two of you after the revelation that your memory is coming back in tiny fragments.

After thorough examination by Asra, Aisha, Salim, Julien and even Nadia (for some reason) everyone concludes the same thing. To your frustration you will likely never regain your full memory in its clarity. Especially not of the plague and the years leading up to it, too traumatic, to full of things to be remembered.

Asra becomes teary eyed every time a small memory comes back. Mostly from eating things or smells or sometimes even physical touch.

You wonder why they didn’t come back in the three years after the plague. Asra’s theory is that your new body only allowed memories to begin returning now that you were truly settled within it. There were no loose ends left to stop you from fully healing.

You like that theory.

The memories come at a rapid pace at first, at least three a day. After a month, you have a rough picture of your childhood. It slows down after that, but from small fragments you soon see Asra and Muriel. Your adult life is a muddy picture made up of slivers of moments, meals, dances, faces of friends on trips you’d never known you’d taken.

On the third month you are working in the library with Julien, Nadia and Salim when you remember the day the plague first broke out in Vesuvia. You don’t know what did it, but one moment you’re looking at maps of the city from the plague-era and the next you are back in the shop with Asra coaxing you out of that catatonic numbness that you thought had left for good.

_You stand at the doors of the palace. Alone. To offer yourself up as an aid in finding the cure. The countess opens the doors herself. Which speaks to the panic that seems to have stricken Vesuvia. Her flowing hair is out of its usual ornaments and her clothes are askew. You can hear yelling inside. She beckons and you enter._

This marks the beginning of the first ‘rough patch’ in your still fairly new relationship with Asra. You’d known that the two of you had been involved before the plague, but the more memories you regained the clearer it was that the two of you had know each other over half your lives. Which Asra had omitted from his stories about your past.

**…**

“I don’t want to leave Vesuvia right now Asra. We’re in the middle of finishing the aqua ducts and soon we will fix up the old quarter.”

“The memories are draining your y/n! You need a break, your becoming as self-sacrificing as Julien and as stubborn as Nadia.”

“I’m not being stubborn! Why do you want us to go so badly? Don’t you think it’s a good thing that I’m regaining my memories?”

“Of course I do y/n—”

“It feels like you don’t want me to know about our past, you know I’ve already pieced together that we’ve know each other half our lives. What are you trying to protect me from? Is this just about hiding things?”

“If you don’t trust me maybe I’ll go on my own.”

_On my own. On my own._

_The words echo through your mind when you wake up in the shop alone. Your plague mask at the bedside table that once held Asra’s bag where Faust would curl up. Now they’re both gone._

_You force yourself up even though your joints creak. Anxiety simmers in your chest but you ignore your pain and fatigue. You tell yourself you’re just tired, but don’t really believe it. The shop reeks of the antiseptic herbs that you stuff in the plague mask. You pull it on anyways and head out into the silent streets. You have reports to deliver to Doctor Devorak._

Julien is the one hovering over you when you come out of it this time. The sun is rising outside and his cool hands are pressing to your forehead.

“Wha?” Your mouth feels like you swallowed a block of salt.

“You went catatonic again.”

“How long?”

“Two days.” Julien sits back and holds a glass to your lips. You fumble to hold it so instead you just let him pour slow water into your dry mouth.

“Asra?”

“Nadi and Portia took him downstairs. He didn’t tell us until last night. He was distraught. Seems to think he triggered it.”

Julien eyes you. You know he’s probably hoping you’ll tell him what happened. He’s incessantly fascinated by your memory’s gradual returning but you say nothing.

“Can you go get Asra?” You croak out.

“Oh! Of course, I’ll send him up and give you two some alone time.”

You drag yourself up on the pillows and listen to the creak of Julien down the steps. Then voices. Then the loud thumping of someone running up the stairs.

Asra bursts into your bedroom with his hair fluffed and his eyes red. They look sore, and when he looks at you, he tears up. He rushes to the bedside but hesitates to touch and instead kneels beside you so he can look you in the eye.

“y/n I am so sorry, that was an awful thing to say.”

“I was being rude. I’m sorry to. You must’ve been scared.”

“We haven’t fought like this—”

“Since you left me, during the plague. Why did you leave Asra?”

His face screws up and you reach out to cup his cheek. It hurts, that memory of waking alone. But it hurts more to not say anything at all. So, you tell him what the memory told you while he looks at you with growing distress plain on his face.

“So why, Asra?

Tears fall freely down his face now.

“I was scared.” He whispers.

“I need more than that.”

“I wanted to get somewhere safe, find the cure elsewhere while keeping ourselves safe. You wanted to stay. We fought. It was vicious. Then I decided to leave on my own because I knew you wouldn’t come with me.”

You nod and lay back on the bed. You pull weakly to make Asra rise with you. It takes a bit of pushing but finally he’s situated with his face buried in the crook of your neck and his limbs askew over yours.

“Are you scared I’ll remember that fight?”

“Terrified.” He takes a deep breath that sounds wet.

“Why?”

“Cause, I was nothing but a ‘cowardly magician hiding behind passivity and magic tricks.’”

“I’m sorry I said that, you aren’t a coward.”

He laughs, “you don’t even remember it and your apologising—you were right.”

“What did you say to me when I called you that?”

He sucks in a breath and stiffens up.

“C’mon Asra, if I’m prepared for it, I won’t go catatonic if it bubbles up.”

“A self-sacrificing fool who loved a dying city more than you loved me.”

“Ooof you got me good,” you laugh.

“Don’t laugh at my deepest regrets y/n.”

You snort again, “don’t be so dramatic.”

Asra lifts his head to look at you with teary eyes. He looks thoroughly unimpressed.

“I forgive you; you know.”

His eyes go wide and then fill again.

“You can’t say that for sure, you don’t remember it!”

“No, I don’t Asra. I probably never will. All I’ll ever have is a patchwork. We are together now, and I love you. I forgive you. You are here now; I am here now. I hope you can forgive me too.”

Asra seems to lose the capacity for words after that and instead buries his face into your neck. He cries a little more and you rub his back until he falls asleep.

…

The memories plateau after that. You don’t regain any more from the time of the plague and the memories return to little bubbles of joy brought forth by sounds and smells. Maybe once every week or so. They don’t even make you pause as you work anymore. They’re unfamiliar, but the feeling of a new memory surfacing becomes normal.

You tell Asra about each one and the rough patch transforms into a new and stronger normal. Asra doesn’t shy away from memories of the past anymore. He still gets a sad faraway look when he sees the Lazaret but now, he lets you hold his hand and tug him away.

A week before the first day of fall you are organizing your shared closet. Nadia is far too generous with gifts since you began working on her various projects around the city and the piles of fine clothing were beginning to get ridiculous.

You’re in the middle of sorting the finery from clothes you both wear when you come across something that you are certain was not a gift from Nadia. A fine silk scarf of pale purple that shimmers like a rainbow when you hold it up to the light.

_Asra gives you a misty grin, your hands tied up in pale purple material that reflects the late summer light. You feel that same material across your naked skin that night and Asra’s hands are—_

You drag yourself out of the memory and sit hard on the bed with the fabric in your hands.

You were married…

You are married.

Does the contract still hold if you die and then are resuscitated through magic? Anger spikes through you. Why didn’t Asra tell you? You cradle the scarf to your chest as if it’s a living thing. Then throw it back to the ground with the rest of the scarves.

You pace the house and try to breathe deeply. This is such a massive thing to omit. You boil the kettle. You stare at your hands. You wonder if you had rings. Probably not. Neither of you seem to be the type. But you probably have some token to carry.

You ‘tidy’ the house as an excuse to touch everything.

Nothing brings up any more memory.

The tea has gone lukewarm, but you still slug it back and try to trace your breathing as you reflect on why Asra wouldn’t tell you. Most of the reasons make sense. Fear of your catatonic state. The need to let you heal. The chance you wouldn’t feel the same anymore. How could he ask you to honor a commitment you don’t remember choosing?

Asra comes home then. He puts his shoes by the door and slings his bag behind the counter. You look up from your seat and he leans down to peck your lips.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, cleaning just took a lot longer than I thought, I’m tired.”

“There’s no way Nadi gave us that much stuff,” he laughs and plants a kiss on your head, “I’ll run us a bath.”

You nod and something warm bubbles in your chest.

It’s a week from the first day of fall.

One week from your wedding anniversary. 

**…**


	2. Reminders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You go to wave away your silencing spell and feel something else. You pause at the bottom of the stairs and feel out with your magic. It’s Asra’s, but paper thin, shaky, haphazard. A silencing spell of his own.  
> You tear through it like wet tissue paper.  
> Then you hear the sobbing."
> 
> MC is excited to celebrate a anniversary, Asra wallows in his least favorite day of the year.

Preparation doesn’t take much. You hide the wedding scarf back where you found it, stock up on Asra’s favorite foods and spend the week shopping for the perfect gift.

You find it when you are out with Portia. It’s simple but beautiful. A lightweight chain with a polished light violet stone on the end, Asra has a few necklaces like it, but this one matches the scarf you found. It refracts rainbow in the sunlight.

You buy it in an unassuming brown paper wrapping and leave it tucked in amongst your belongings in the bedside table. Amongst the strange trinkets and spell ingredients strewn about you know Asra will never question the new package. 

The harder part is not telling him. As each day brings you closer to the anniversary it’s harder to hold your tongue. Harder to not roll on top of him in the morning and force him to tell you every moment of the wedding in precise detail. Who asked who? Did anyone else know? Had he told Aisha and Salim?

You let the excitement keep you from saying a thing and instead you throw yourself into collecting ingredients for the shop. Usually you spend the end of your workweek re-stocking, but you get it done early so the two of you can take a day off together as a surprise.

**…**

On your anniversary Asra is up and out of bed before you. For a moment you wonder what’s got him so worried when you realize he probably hadn’t even thought about it as your anniversary.

You find him downstairs preparing a plate of eggs with Faust curled around his neck.

“Good morning,” he says as you wrap your arms around his waist.

“Hmmm,” you peck Faust on the head, and she slithers from his neck to yours as you cuddle closer.

Asra chuckles and pats your arms before sliding out of your grip to place the plate on the table.

“Sorry I can’t join you to eat I have to go help Muriel today,” he kisses your cheek and makes a beeline for the front door.

“Oh, that’s okay. I’m going to the palace today; Nadia has a new proposal she’s working on drafting. I’ll see you here for dinner?” Faust slides down your arm and you hand her off to him while he laces up his boots.

“Sure, I can pick something up on my way back.”

“It’s kind of out of your way, don’t worry I’ll bring something from the palace.”

He avoids your gaze when he straightens up, his hand already on the doorknob.

“Okay, that sounds nice. I’ll see you then.”

“Love you.”

“Love you too,” and he’s out the door and gone without a backward glance.

It’s strange, but often Asra can be cryptic. You’ll ask later. First, you have a day to get through of finishing spells, making deliveries and preparing a meal.

…

You accidently dawdle eating the eggs and get a slow start on the spells. Then your deliveries go awry when someone gives you the wrong direction and you end up in the opposite part of town from where you were supposed to be going.

You end up jogging the last part of the way home. You open the door and curse when you find Asra’s boots. Luckily, the shop is silent.

He must be napping.

You cast a silencing spell and get to work, praying he won’t wake up on his own.

You pin Salim’s instructions for preparing the Blue-Tongued Skink to the wall while you work. He’d been more than happy to oblige in helping you when you’d asked, even if you’d been unable to tell him what the occasion was. His instructions are clear and simple, you follow them as carefully as you would a new spell.

Once you have it cooking without any accidents you set up the table. New Beeswax candle balls, the nicest of your plates and a bottle of champagne that Portia may or may not have ‘borrowed’ from the palace for you. You were just saving it for the right moment.

All that’s left if the small package hidden in the upstairs bedroom with the pendant in it.

And planning what you’re going to say, which you had been stewing about all week. You just hadn’t decided yet.

Do you start with telling him? Do you let him eat first and then tell him? Do you give him the gift and hope that he makes the connection immediately? What if he doesn’t even remember what day it is? What if you messed up the date and look like a fool? Asra would probably still appreciate the gesture so you guess it won’t matter if you got the date wrong. How do you ask someone if they still want to be married? How do you say you want to tell their parents, to tell your friends?

_friend! friend!_

“Faust?”

You hunt around and find her shape slithering into the room as fast as she could wiggle.

_Up! Up!_

You pick her up and she wriggles around your wrist to give it a squeeze.

“Is Asra still sleeping?” She doesn’t answer you, but you feel her sadness. You take the skink off the burner and turn to head upstairs.

You go to wave away your silencing spell and feel something else. You pause at the bottom of the stairs and feel out with your magic. It’s Asra’s, but paper thin, shaky, haphazard. A silencing spell of his own.

You tear through it like wet tissue paper.

Then you hear the sobbing.

It’s loud, harsh, gasping. 

You take the stairs swiftly and quietly

You open the door slowly and enter with careful movements. Asra doesn’t move from where he’s curled up at the foot of the bed. He’s sobbing so loud he probably didn’t even hear you enter the room.

You’re frozen to the spot. You’ve never seen him like this. Yes, Asra cries, but this is something else. It’s uninhibited, shakes his entire body, makes his magic which is usually graceful and strong into something that you can break with the slightest touch. It’s heartbreaking. 

Faust, in the meantime, has slithered off your arm down the bookcase and across the floor to boop at Asra’s leg.

He glances up with reddened eyes, still gasping, and jumps at the sight of you standing there. He scrubs at his face harshly and falls silent except for his harsh and quickening breathing.

You move towards him slowly and steadily getting to your knees in front of him.

“Asra, love, I need you to breath for me. Follow my breaths.” You start a slow pattern of in and out making it loud for him to mimic.

“Sory-” he chokes out.

“Don’t be sorry, just breath. I’ve got you.”

It takes about ten minutes of deep breathing until Asra’s body begins to relax from the tight ball he’d curled himself into.

“May I touch you?” He nods and you lean forward and pull him close.

When his face touches your shoulder, he gives another shuddery gasp and your shirt starts to wet. His hands come up to grasp at your back. Holding you tight.

“Did something happen with Muriel?”

He shakes his head.

“Did you have a nightmare?”

“No…” he croaks.

“Is it about me?” You ask.

He stiffens up in your arms and you pet his hair until his shoulders loosen and his dead weight falls against you.

“It’s alright if it is. I’m here.”

He takes a deep and shaking breath before speaking.

“I just love you so much y/n and it’s so hard. I feel so awful, I’m mourning a life we used to have when we have a new life now, here, together. Your right in front of me but some days are just harder than others and I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, I know it’s not the same.”

“Don’t say that! You’re you, don’t doubt that you’re the same person to me as you ever were,” Asra rises up a bit to look you in the eye. It’s sweet, but you refuse to let him turn this around and begin comforting you.

“There’s nothing wrong with change Asra, I’m different. I hope every day that I’m not the same person who stayed during the plague, the same person who let you walk away from them.” Asra frowns and you hold his hands.

“You aren’t the same person either Asra. The Lazaret is still there but flowers are starting to grow. You said it yourself, we have a new life,” he nods, “but it’s okay to look back. You spent so long taking care of me, did you ever take the time to mourn?” He freezes when you ask and looks to the floor, shaking his head.

“That’s a heavy burden to carry on your own Asra, I can help you if you’d let me.”

Asra tugs on his hair and pulls his arms away from you.

“How could I put this on you y/n. It’s not your responsibility to share this hurt. There are thing’s you’ll never remember and if I forget them maybe I can just be at peace but if I forget them it’s like letting a part of you die and I just! I can’t—I can’t—” He lets out a sob and stutters off, so you pull him up off the floor. Without a moment to let him think you lay him out on the bed so you can clamber atop him—letting your body press down into his chest to stave off his returning panic.

The scarf you’d found just over a week ago falls off Asra’s lap and onto the floor.

He wraps his arms around your waist and buries his face in your hair.

“You can tell them to me then, I’ll always listen.” He tenses again and you can practically taste his refusal, “please Asra, since the memories started to return, I’m getting better when I remember, I don’t get stuck the way I used to. This is hurting you— please, even just something small like what we ate for breakfast or what clothes we wore or someone we met. We can’t move on unless we face it. All of it.” You feel your eyes growing wet too when Asra whispers a quiet agreement and it feels like a massive victory as he weeps openly into your neck until he relaxes underneath you as if a great strain in his body had been released.

You’ve almost fallen asleep on top of Asra when you remember the food and nearly jump up. Instead you pull back slowly and Asra clutches the edges of your shirt.

“I was making dinner, have you eaten?” He shakes his head, “do you want me to bring it here or do you want to come with me and eat together at the table?”

“I’ll come with you.”

He’s clingy in the sweetest way as you both get up from the bed and head down the stairs. His fingers are firmly intertwined with yours until you reach the bottom of the stairs and he freezes.

“Is that Blue-Tongued Skink?”

You make your way over to the pan on the stove and whisper a quick spell to bring it back up too temperature.

“Possibly,” you wink. Asra seems dazed as he sits at the table and scrutinizes the bottle of champagne.

He watches silently as you plate the dish with a flourish which Salim had demonstrated for you and place it in front of him. You then pop the bottle open and pour a glass each then quickly light the candles with your fingertips.

“What’s the occasion?” Your palms feel sweaty, Asra still looks pale and tired. Was this really the right time to have this conversation? You nod and he digs into the dish with a pleased hum.

“I think you might’ve guessed that I was hoping to spoil you tonight.”

“You’ve succeeded,” Asra smirks but it’s a lot less sexy with grease across his lips. 

“I finished all the orders for the next week and stocked up on all the ingredients we need. I already spoke with Nadia so we both have the weekend off; I was hoping we could go on a trip—wherever you want?” You feel a bubble of pride when Asra’a eyebrows shoot up. “I’m sorry I didn’t notice you were hurting this bad Asra, I want to spend this weekend on us and on you. It’s only a start but I hope you can tell me everything you’ve been thinking.”

You almost backtrack when his eyes fill with tears again.

“Thank you,” he whispers, “I love you.”

“I love you, and I have a gift for you. I’ll be right back.” You race up the stairs and your heart feels fast from the nerves. This is it. You need to tell Asra.

You find the package with the pendant and the scarf which he had left on the floor and begin to make your way back down when you think better.

“Close your eyes,” you holler down the stairs. Asra laughs.

His eyes are closed when you return, so you sit back down with the scarf hidden in your lap and the small brown paper wrapped pendant on the center of the table. You lean across the table and give him a quick kiss.

“You can open them, but before you open that Asra I need to apologize for hiding it from you this past week.”

“That’s ominous,” he raises a brow and begins to pull apart your wrapping.

You clutch the scarf under the table while the brown paper reveals the pale pendant and chain. Asra sucks in a breath when he sees it. Your words feel heavy in your mouth.

“It’s beautiful y/n, thank you.”

It’s now or never.

“It reminded me of this,” you pull out the scarf and his brows pull up and together, “I found it, about a week ago. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t know how to feel at first and then I realized the first day of fall was coming so soon.”

He’s not moving or blinking, just staring between you and the scarf.

“I just wanted you to know I understand why you wouldn’t tell me. I wanted to surprise you for the anniversary but also, I guess this is me asking if you’d want to, to maybe, renew our vows? uh—are you okay Asra?”

“How much did you remember?” He mumbles, wide eyes and slack jawed.

“Not much, the date of the anniversary, I saw you and our hands wrapped up and it wasn’t really hard to piece together…I saw a bit of the night after… I don’t know if you still want to be uhm,” the word is hard to say aloud, “married— but I realized I don’t mind the idea at all and this,” you clutch the scarf to your chest, “this feels important even if I don’t remember everything.”

Asra doesn’t say anything, just stares at you. Your chest feels tight.

“I’m sorry I didn’t say anything or maybe you’re uncomfortable? I understand if it’s not something you want anymore. A lot has happened,” your cheeks burn with shame and you have to stop looking at him, “I would never ask you to do something you’re uncomfortable with, I’m just happy we’re together and I—wagh!!” Asra lurches forwards, nearly knocking the plates off the table and drags you by your collar into a mind-numbingly deep kiss.

His soft lips move aggressively against yours and he somehow maneuvers around the edge of the table to deposit himself into your lap so that he can press himself chest to chest with you. It feels like he’s trying to melt into you, his arms wrapped around your neck tightly like he’s holding on for dear life. You moan into it, that is, until you taste salt.

You finally pull away with a wet sound and get your hands onto his shoulders to push him back a bit. Tears are rolling down his cheeks.

“Oh gods I’m sorry Asra. Did I hurt you? Was it something I said?”

“I want that too; don’t ever think I don’t want that y/n.”

“Want wha—oh.” He’s smiling brightly through the tears like he can’t decide what to feel, he reaches behind himself and hands you the necklace. You get the message and carefully unclasp it, letting your fingers drag across his tan skin to clasp it.

You can’t help but run a hand over the smooth pendant once it’s on and Asra is radiant with his violet eyes misting over again.

So you kiss him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love to write angst! I hope you enjoyed! stay tuned for more Arcana content hopefully <3

**Author's Note:**

> Hey folks. A departure from my usual fandom, and a real challenge stylistically with the POV. I hope you enjoyed as much as I enjoy imagining what the MC forgot! Thanks for reading!


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